With many vintage LPs in frames around my house... I have found it really bizarre how many of the records I have purchased/found where the owner had WRITTEN THEIR NAME or put a label on the LP cover somewhere.

Sometimes it was discreetly written on the back... other times it was in giant ink letters right through the face of the people on the cover.

In all my years of owning CD's I cant ever recall being compelled to write my name on the cases... why would they ever get mixed up with someone elses if they only sat in MY car or house?

With a record, the portability is even less (house only) so Im unclear why so many record owners were compelled to write all over them and ruin otherwise lovely cover art.

I've noticed it too. Especially at garage & estate sales where at one sale, every record in the box will have the owner's signature scrawled across it in pen. Then at the next sale, no signatures.

My guess is that buying a record was a more-significant expenditure back in the 50s and 60s than buying a cd is today. I think people must have lent them out like books.

I've also had a hint at Lodge Sales, (like an Elks lodge), Club Sales (like a motorcycle club), and Church sales, when they're clearing out the location's own record collection (as opposed to just a box of donations). At a few of these, almost every record in the box had a signature and the signatures were different. This makes me think that the lodge or church listening library was made up of donations from its members and that these were expected to be returned to their rightful owners at some time.

While on a trip to LA last year I noticed an abundance of records with the name Ira Cook scribbled very large on the cover of every album this guy owned. Some scrawled right over someones face!! I thought to myself "what an idiot". My Dad noticed a bunch of these as well and was downright disgusted that anyone would do this.

Later, I found out that Ira Cook was a big DJ in LA back in the 60's and 70's and even wrote liner notes for LP's as well.

Maybe this was his way of keeping his personal collection away from the radio station copies, I don't know.

The Clean Cover Gel is great for cleaning and restoring luster to record covers on its own, applied with a paper towel or cloth. Just make sure you apply to the paste-down art itself and don't get any on the spine or edges of the jacket as these areas can soak up the gel and get discolored. However, applied to the glossy artwork on a record cover, it acts like Armor-All does to car interiors. It can even minimize scuffs and ringwear. And it sure cleans out that ingrained dirt and dust.

However, if you pair it with a damp Magic Eraser, it can remove some pen marks. The Clean Cover Gel diminishes the abrasive effect of the Magic Eraser. I apply it very gently and I've had pen marks disappear like magic on without effecting the color underneath. However, some pens (like markers) soak in too deep into the label and by the time you make progress removing the ink, you've also removed the color underneath. So be careful - but since the cover was already marred by the pen signature, a little removal of the color isn't necessarily worse.

Ira made a career out of his association with Hawaiian music. He played one Hawaiian song an hour and brought Don Ho to the Mainland at the height of Ho's career. “In college I became intrigued with Hawaiian music and I went to the Islands for 12 years straight.” Another of his popular features was "Star of the Day," in which Ira featured one track from one artist every half-hour. Between 1960 and 1972, Ira hosted over 3,000 AFRTS programs "It was really fascinating getting letters from servicemen in Iceland asking about Hawaiian music. It seemed to be as popular there as country music."

Today, I'm going through the old 10-inch LP records, a format that just preceded the 12 -inch platters and in fact, they co-existed for a while. The ones I've selected are rare or strange..

Now, THIS is a gem of musical history interest. King's serenade vol. 1 (I've never seen vol. 2 if it was ever recorded) features the compositions of wildly famous Hawaiian composer, Charles E. King...responsible for hundreds of songs, many still performed today. However, what's interesting here is that Charles E. King himself gives a descriptive introduction to each selection. Hal Aloma performs Hawaiian Wedding Song, Eleu mikmiki, and others.

This is an American release on Mercury, but features French steel guitarist Marcel Bianchi & His Hawaiian Orchestra. Blue Hawaii, Hawaiian sun, Kahoula serenade, and others. Nice cover art.

An Australian release, Aloha Hawaii features this unlikely list of artists: Lila Lani, Ko Latane, with Nalu Mehana & The Pacific Islanders. A very inviting cover, don't you think?

More terrific cover art on this RCA Victor release from Sam Makia & his Waikikians. Sam Makia was one of my favorites steel players. His playing was always very sweet, quivering, almost like he was ready to have an emotional breakdown..lol...very beautiful. This earlier release, however, seems to rely more on the vocal stylings of The Waikikians.

Budget label Remington put out this treasure by The Waikiki Wanderers Orchestra....Hal Aloma recording under a pseudonym. These same recordings would be repackaged by others early budget labels as The Plymouth Hawaiian Orchestra on Plymouth Records, etc., etc. I like the hula girls enclosed by the floral wreath.

The Tau Moe Family spent most of their lives AWAY from Hawaii travelling around the world performing their music only returning to Hawaii for occassional family visits. Here's proof. The Tau Moe Family in a release from Yugoslavia.

The aforementioned 49th State Hawaii record company, in addition to it's hundreds of 45 rpm singles, collected songs into compilations of 'native artists' in both 12 inch and 10 inch formats. While the 12 inch LPs had amazing and varied photographs, for whatever reason, their 10 inch releases featured either a plain red or yellow jacket with lettering only OR this far superior painting. The were all called Souvenir songs of Hawaii and each simply had a different volume number with the same artwork. This is volume 26.

Without a doubt, a BEAUTIFUL, exotic painting. It's the type you wish you could find the original or a print and blow it up to frame...just fantastic. I distinctly recall my jaw dropping the moment I found this as I'd never seen it before and the cover is just breathtaking. An early Jerry Byrd steel guitar lp.

A Japanese recording of typical dance band tunes with no relationship to Hawaii that I can decipher, but a great jacket nonetheless.

Distinctive artwork on this German 10 inch featuring the likes of Club Indonesia, Valentinos Hawaiian Band and others. I really enjoy some of the German 'Hawaiian' releases & this one is no exception. A great rendition of West of Samoa and Domingo Santo Domingo (well...it's a tropical island, right?).